Ex-Shell boss tasked with cleaning up Nigeria's oil sector
Nigeria's president has appointed Bayo Ojulari - a former Shell executive - to lead the state-owned oil company, as part of sweeping reforms aimed at cleaning up the sector dogged by allegations of corruption, pollution and decades-long inefficiency.
Mr Ojulari was picked in a "crucial" overhaul of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC), the presidency said on Wednesday.
It added that the restructure - which also involved the entire board being replaced - was necessary to drive economic growth in Africa's biggest oil exporter.
President Bola Tinubu's time in power has seen a series of economic shocks, with food and fuel prices rocketing over the past couple of years.
In its statement announcing the NNPC restructure, the presidency said Tinubu wishes to boost Nigeria's oil output and refining capability.
Nigeria's oil production slowed to less than a million barrels per day in 2023, news agency AFP reported.
Tinubu's administration wants to hit two million barrels per day of oil by 2027 and three million barrels per day by 2030.
Tasked with executing this mission, Mr Ojulari replaces former NNPC boss Mele Kyari.
Mr Ojulari joined Shell Nigeria 1991 and during his 24 years there, he held roles within the country as well as Europe and the Middle East.
Mr Ojulari rose to become the Managing Director of Shell, a position he held for six years. He left the company in 2021 to join the investment advisory organisation BAT Advisory and Energy Company.
He then moved to Renaissance Africa Energy Company last year.
Along with trying to boost Nigeria's oil production, Mr Olujari will no doubt also seek to improve the NNPC's poor public image.
For many years, under previous governments, much of the company's profits never reached the treasury. And it is only in the last five years that the NNPC has been publishing accounts.
The NNPC has also been under financial strain - last September it admitted to having debts of around $6bn (£4.5m).
The NNPC and Nigeria's 'oil mafia'
Oil clean-up 'scam' warnings ignored by Shell, whistleblower tells BBC
Why Nigerians are praying for the success of a new refinery
Nigeria's stolen oil, the military and a man named Government
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‘Where was God?' The Mother Emanuel AME Church shooting 10 years later.
Get The Gavel A weekly SCOTUS explainer newsletter by columnist Kimberly Atkins Stohr. Enter Email Sign Up This was quite remarkable, because less than 48 hours earlier, on the night of June 17, 2015, Sanders had just closed her eyes in benediction — during Bible study at her beloved Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church — when she was jolted by an explosion of gunfire. The 57-year-old woman, a fourth-generation member of 'Mother Emanuel,' the oldest A.M.E. church in the South, dove under a table and pulled her 11-year-old granddaughter down with her. She squeezed the child so tightly she feared she might crush her, instructing her to play dead as a 21-year-old white supremacist methodically assassinated nine of the 12 Black worshippers in the basement fellowship hall. Those she watched die included her 26-year-old son, Tywanza Sanders, who had tried vainly to distract the shooter, and her 87-year-old aunt, Susie Jackson, who was shredded by 10 hollow-point bullets. At one point, Sanders smeared her legs with the blood pooling at her feet so that the killer might think he had finished her off. It worked. What happened in court two days later, a procession of forgiveness by Black victims for a remorseless racist murderer, both awed and befuddled the world. Many found it to be the purest expression of Christianity they had ever witnessed and could not imagine ever being graced in any such way. With the help of a soaring and melodic eulogy for the victims by President Barack Obama, the church known as Mother Emanuel soon became an earthly emblem of amazing grace. FILE - Tyrone Sanders and Felicia Sanders comfort each other at the graveside of their son, Tywanza Sanders, on June 27, 2015, at Emanuel AME Cemetery in Charleston, S.C. (Grace Beahm/The Post And Courier via AP, File) Grace Beahm/Associated Press Now fast-forward to December 2016. Felicia Sanders is back in court, the lead witness in the death penalty trial of Dylann Roof. 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Emanuel's predecessor congregation, which formed in 1817 after a subversive walkout from Methodist churches by free and enslaved Black Charlestonians, faced immediate harassment from white authorities. The police raided services and jailed worshippers by the scores. When an incipient slave insurrection plot was uncovered in 1822 and traced back in part to the church, 35 men were led to the gallows, nearly half of them from the congregation. The wood-frame building was dismantled by order of the authorities and the church's leading ministers forced into exile. Emanuel's founding pastor after the Civil War, Richard Harvey Cain, used its pulpit as a springboard into politics, winning seats in the state legislature and Congress in a career that mirrored at first the heady hope and then the stolen promise of Reconstruction. During the depths of Jim Crow, Charlestonians assembled at Emanuel to voice outrage over lynchings and jurisprudential travesties. 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A horse-drawn carriage carried the casket of the late South Carolina State Senator Clementa Pinckney past the Confederate flag and onto the grounds of the South Carolina State Capitol in Columbia, S.C. on June 24, 2015. REUTERS The weight of it all takes the breath away. And for many, forgiveness might seem an inadequate response, given available options like anger, bitterness, hatred, revenge, retribution. A more natural one, perhaps a more human one, might even be 'Where was God?' But in interviews over the years, each of the six family members who spoke mercifully toward Dylann Roof explained that they did so for their own spiritual release. They depicted the moment in mystical terms — unpremeditated, unexpected, the words just flowed, it was God talking. But none said they meant for their words to be read as a grant of exoneration or a pass from accountability. No slate had been wiped. 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Partnership Overview The MoU establishes a structured alliance between three institutions: - A Newport Beach–based provider of advanced artificial intelligence technologies, including large-scale reasoning models, domain-specific AI agents, and swarm-intelligent orchestration systems. is internationally recognized as the pioneer of agentic AGI, a paradigm that fuses decentralized intelligence, ethical alignment, and cognitive adaptability at national and enterprise scale. DV8 Infosystems - The official orchestration and systems integration partner of DV8 designs and deploys agentic AGI infrastructures through its suite of Ops AI systems orchestrated by swarm intelligence and tailored for government transformation, regulatory alignment, and real-world integration of multi-agent intelligence systems. KICTANet - Kenya's most respected Think Tank on ICT policy and regulation whose mission is to promote an enabling digital ecosystem that is open, inclusive, secure, and rights-based, through multi-stakeholder approaches. KICTANet provides mechanisms and a framework for continuing cooperation and collaboration in the field of ICT among industry, technical community, academia, media, civil society, development partners, and government. Purpose and Strategic ObjectivesUnder the MoU KICTANet, in partnership with DV8 Infosystems will among others, jointly refine and enhance Kenya's National AI Strategy 2025-2030; contribute technical, ethical, and regulatory design elements rooted in best practice and African contextual realities; embed participatory engagement mechanisms to ensure the inclusion of underrepresented voices; and deliver a comprehensive, publication-ready policy framework to the Government of Kenya. The review will be inclusive and multistakeholder and will take into account ethical and regulatory considerations in line with Kenya's constitutional, economic, and cultural priorities. A Joint Policy Task Team may be constituted to oversee the process, coordinate stakeholder input, and interface with relevant government authorities. Statement from "What we're building is not a document. It's a national protocol for intelligence itself," said Bill Faruki, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of "Kenya is not merely responding to global AI trends—it is positioning to set them. This partnership reflects a shift in the balance of influence in global tech policy. We are honored to help architect cognitive infrastructure that is sovereign by design and exponential by nature." Speaking at the ceremony, Dr. Grace Githaiga, Chief Executive Officer of KICTANet stated that."KICTANet views this MoU as a pivotal moment in our national journey toward responsible AI. We are pleased to align with technical partners that recognize the societal weight of this policy work and the urgency of getting it right." Continental and Global RelevanceThis collaboration signals a new chapter in Kenya's digital transformation narrative. By developing a sovereign AI governance model, Kenya positions itself as a thought leader in the global transition toward ethical, inclusive, and locally grounded artificial intelligence. About is a provider of advanced artificial intelligence technologies, including large reasoning models, domain-specific agents, and agentic orchestration frameworks. Headquartered in Newport Beach, California, is the recognized pioneer of agentic AGI, merging swarm intelligence, contextual adaptability, and scalable governance design to support institutions, governments, and ecosystems in deploying sovereign-grade AI systems. Website: | Email: hello@ | Contact: +1 (949) 200-8668 About DV8 InfosystemsDV8 Infosystems is an agentic AI systems orchestrator and integration partner to The company specializes in the delivery of orchestrated, real-world multi-agent systems for national transformation, regulatory automation, and enterprise-level implementation of cognitive architectures across industries and governments. About KICTANetKICTANet is a multi-stakeholder Think Tank for ICT policy and regulation. The Think Tank is a catalyst for reform in the Information and Communication Technology sector. KICTANet's mission is to promote an enabling digital ecosystem that is open, inclusive, secure, and rights-based, through multi-stakeholder approaches. Website: | Email: info@ | Contact: +254 751 000 001Media ContactMarc OrtizEmail : David Indeje,Email: dindeje@ View original content to download multimedia: SOURCE Inc. Sign in to access your portfolio
